{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4164", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 4164, "subject": "Whorl <> Second Empire", "messages": 5, "voices": 4, "first": "2003-08-16T03:10:54+00:00", "last": "2003-08-19T01:05:47+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2003-08-16T03:10:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Whorl <> Second Empire", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Whoops, I missed one point from before, when Andrew Bollen wrote:\n- Typhon in New Sun at least desires to rule an inter-stellar empire, and\noffers Sev the job of satrap of Earth. How does this make any sense without\nsuperluminal travel?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Andrew, for starters you seem to be insisting that Typhon's post-Urth\ncapital will be in another star system. I, for one, have always assumed it\nwould be on Skuld, our Venus terraformed." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Sure, all this cool stuff is available to non-Urthians, and quite likely to\nNew Sun Typhon, but there's no hint that it's anywhere on the Whorl. I\nsuppose you could say it's there, but unused, given Typhon's premature\ndemise." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "We are not communicating here. I did not mean to suggest that there was an\nansible on the Whorl; I tried to say that an ansible network would ease the\nruling of an STL empire. I did not mean to suggest that Typhon, the\noriginal, biological man, would personally visit the colony set up by the\nWhorl; I did try to say that the colonization project was a hedge, so that\neven if his empire should fail, there would be this mark he had made on the\ngalaxy in the form of a colony world that worshipped his computer-version\npersona. Just as the mountain was carved =should he die.=" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But I don't think New Sun Typhon would be satisfied with a STL empire.\nDoesn't he say somewhere that he and his followers returned from the stars?\nIf I've got that right, did they come back frozen in a slow-boat? Does this\nstory of his return really square very well with Roger's description of\nTyphopn's rise in IGJ? In Claw (?) Typhon talks of delaying his decision to\nleave Urth too long - was he planning to freeze himself on a slow-boat? is\nhis digital presence on the Whorl a kind of poor-man's alternative?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't recall a passage about Typhon and his followers returning from the\nstars. All this talk of freezing is kind of beside the point. If Typhon\ndid come from another star system I'm fairly certain it wasn't nearly as\nfar as the Blue/Green system is (iirc it seems like 500 to 900 light years\naway)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Obviously, all of these things which look like mis-matches to me can be\nglued together, but I think it needs some fairly sticky chewing gum to do\nit." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Or we could look at your unexamined assumptions and see how strongly the\ntext supports them. Or not." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "So why the Whorl? Another hedge, I say. While all the other stuff is\nconquer and control, this other project will be \"pure\" colonization." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But at some point the :\"real\" Typhon is going to want to take control -\nwhat's the point of having even an empire if you don't get to rule it? Will\nhe have to assert his authority over his digital avatar via ansible? Of\ncourse, you can postulate some kind of built-in thingy giving real Typhon\nauthority over digital Pas, but I don't find it very convincing." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Again, the Whorl is a =different= project from the Second Empire project.\nColony <> Second Empire. I don't agree with the notion that Typhon plans\nto visit. If he thinks he will be immortal, which seems plausible, then he\nwill be pleased to hear from them." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't understand this point. If Typhon can stock the Whorl with many\nthousands of chem soldiers, why does he not use them on Urth? Perhaps they\nwere intended just for the Whorl, but again I find this quite dubious. Why\nshould it be so?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "We have different perspectives, clearly. I thought that the Whorl project\nwas a contributing factor in the =stripping= of resources from Urth, =such\nthat= chems and the like could no longer be supported at the level that\npasses for \"living.\" (You seem to be ignoring the obvious non-Jonas\nexamples of machine life =seen= on Urth, that is, the mountain-carvers, but\nwho can blame you? They are very enigmatic.)\n\nAs for the nature of the battle on Urth, my impression was that Urth at\nthat point was a palace-grounds, and the battle was a family-fight with all\nthe limited resources at hand. The Whorl had already left by the time the\nrebellion began -- in fact, as you pointed out, =all= the functional ships\nwere gone by that time.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "matthew.malthouse", "address": "matthew.malthouse at guardian.co.uk" }, "date": "2003-08-18T08:16:29+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Whorl <> Second Empire", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 16/08/2003 04:10:54 Michael Andre-Driussi wrote:\n I, for one, have always assumed it [Typhon's new capital post \nre-awakening]\nwould be on Skuld, our Venus terraformed." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Why?\n\nMatthew" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2003-08-18T17:41:38+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Whorl <> Second Empire", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Mattew quoted me and wrote:\n I, for one, have always assumed it [Typhon's new capital post\nre-awakening]\nwould be on Skuld, our Venus terraformed." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Why?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I guess I'm just a sucker for Thea's story about Skuld as \"the world of the\nfuture.\" \n\nIt does seem to me that Skuld would be the planet in the solar system most\nlikely to be in relatively good shape (material resources, solar\ninsolation, etc.). But this is pure conjecture, based upon what little we\nknow about the duration of posthistorical resource exploitation (Skuld\ncould very well be as stripped as Urth is).\n\nI also think that Typhon is offering Severian Urth, not the entire solar\nsystem. Implying that there will be an autarch of Verthandi and an autarch\nof Skuld, etc. Which brings us to the question: how many of the several\nworlds he claims to have controlled were located in the solar system\nitself, and how much interstellar reach did he ever have, anyway?\n\nAs for the scope of the First Empire, there is talk in the text, iirc, of\nthe humans leaping from galaxy to galaxy. So if we take this for truth,\nthen it is an intergalactic empire.\n\nThere does seem to be FTL travel, but in that can of worms it seems to me\nthat one must establish a model of how it works, because it does not seem\nto be as simple as a Star Trek warp drive. I sense that the space ships\n(the tenders) are as innocent of acceleration as Le Guin's starships:\ntheirs are reactionless drives that go from the ground to the sky in the\ntwinkle of an eye, without crushing the human passengers into goo or\nleaving a radioactive crater. And yet, for all of that, the starship\n(which seems to operate under similar if not the same rules) still takes\nmonths of travel before it crosses over into hyperspace.\n\nWhen they sail out of Briah, is that literally the Grand Gnab they are\nseeing, or is it just a visual effect? If it is real then the ship is\nsomething like a quasar that avoids the monobloc, and travel back to Briah,\nat any point in its timeline, becomes problematic. Or so it seems to me.\n\nA detail which causes no end of arguments is the nature of timeflow in\nhyperspace. I think it flows in a direction opposite to that in Briah, so\nthat rather than \"instantaneous\" interstellar travel one gets something\nmore like \"retrogressive\" interstellar travel -- you arrive long before you\never left. (Some trips could be made to seem Star Trek warp-like by\njuggling the ride up to Yesod and the ride down from Yesod: these periods\nof pseudoacceleration will always be in Briah (i.e., positive) time, so the\nmonths of the ride up will be mirrored by the months of pseudodeceleration\n-- added to the timeflow perceived by the crew, of course, but possibly\nclose to instantaneous to a viewer outside of the Ship.) A side effect of\nthis would mean that the galaxy becomes populated by Earth in the\nincreasingly deep past, and far travelers who return to Earth will find\nthemselves in the far past. But this on the surface contradicts what we\nthink we know about Jonas, who is presented as a sailor from the past,\nwashed up on Urth's shores by relativistic effects (yet as I say, these\neffects will come into play as the Ship is riding down from Yesod).\n\nI have said too much.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Alice K. Turner", "address": "aturner6 at nyc.rr.com" }, "date": "2003-08-19T00:38:46+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Whorl <> Second Empire", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "mantis said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I also think that Typhon is offering Severian Urth, not the entire solar\nsystem. Implying that there will be an autarch of Verthandi and an\nautarch\nof Skuld, etc. Which brings us to the question: how many of the several\nworlds he claims to have controlled were located in the solar system\nitself, and how much interstellar reach did he ever have, anyway?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Agreed, and I'm sure Nutria does too; it's a clear New Testament echo. And I\ndon't think he had any interstellar reach whatsoever; there's no proof that\nhierodules were visiting in his time even if \"living backward.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "As for the scope of the First Empire, there is talk in the text, iirc, of\nthe humans leaping from galaxy to galaxy. So if we take this for truth,\nthen it is an intergalactic empire.\n\nThere does seem to be FTL travel, but in that can of worms it seems to me\nthat one must establish a model of how it works, because it does not seem\nto be as simple as a Star Trek warp drive. I sense that the space ships\n(the tenders) are as innocent of acceleration as Le Guin's starships:\ntheirs are reactionless drives that go from the ground to the sky in the\ntwinkle of an eye, without crushing the human passengers into goo or\nleaving a radioactive crater. And yet, for all of that, the starship\n(which seems to operate under similar if not the same rules) still takes\nmonths of travel before it crosses over into hyperspace.\n\nWhen they sail out of Briah, is that literally the Grand Gnab they are\nseeing, or is it just a visual effect? If it is real then the ship is\nsomething like a quasar that avoids the monobloc, and travel back to\nBriah,\nat any point in its timeline, becomes problematic. Or so it seems to me.\n\nA detail which causes no end of arguments is the nature of timeflow in\nhyperspace. I think it flows in a direction opposite to that in Briah, so\nthat rather than \"instantaneous\" interstellar travel one gets something\nmore like \"retrogressive\" interstellar travel -- you arrive long before\nyou\never left. (Some trips could be made to seem Star Trek warp-like by\njuggling the ride up to Yesod and the ride down from Yesod: these periods\nof pseudoacceleration will always be in Briah (i.e., positive) time, so\nthe\nmonths of the ride up will be mirrored by the months of pseudodeceleration\n-- added to the timeflow perceived by the crew, of course, but possibly\nclose to instantaneous to a viewer outside of the Ship.) A side effect of\nthis would mean that the galaxy becomes populated by Earth in the\nincreasingly deep past, and far travelers who return to Earth will find\nthemselves in the far past. But this on the surface contradicts what we\nthink we know about Jonas, who is presented as a sailor from the past,\nwashed up on Urth's shores by relativistic effects (yet as I say, these\neffects will come into play as the Ship is riding down from Yesod).\n\nI have said too much." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No, you haven't. It'a just a consequence of GW's having tried to cobble\nseveral sf traditions together that sensibly shouldn't be cobbled. NS not\nonly has FtL effects, but the ship, through some post-Einsteinian doodah\nthat makes my head spin can get there before it started. LS has tradional\n(in sf) generational travel, and seems pretty well thought out. SS has\ninstantaneous magic flights to other planets that hark back to Burroughs.\nWhat's not to be confused about? Sometimes I think you guys spend a lot more\ntime than the author did trying to make sense of all this.\n\nMatthew Malthouse, that was a nice post about Hindustani, Hindi and Urdu.\nI've tried to explain this myself (lived in India for a while) but never so\nclearly.\n\nMarc, I love the last volume of Proust's RoTP--just about makes it worth\nslogging through the rest .\n\n-alga" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Buice", "address": "mabuice at uchicago.edu" }, "date": "2003-08-19T01:05:47+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Whorl <> Second Empire", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Monday, August 18, 2003, at 07:38 PM, Alice K. Turner wrote:\nNo, you haven't. It'a just a consequence of GW's having tried to cobble\nseveral sf traditions together that sensibly shouldn't be cobbled. NS \nnot\nonly has FtL effects, but the ship, through some post-Einsteinian \ndoodah\nthat makes my head spin can get there before it started. LS has \ntradional\n(in sf) generational travel, and seems pretty well thought out. SS has\ninstantaneous magic flights to other planets that hark back to \nBurroughs.\nWhat's not to be confused about? Sometimes I think you guys spend a \nlot more\ntime than the author did trying to make sense of all this." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "IMHO, Wolfe \"cobbled\" rather well. One of the many things I appreciate \nabout Gene Wolfe's writing is the way he deals with science. Since \nnone of the major \"authors\" in the Sun universe are scientists \nthemselves, we're to expect some confusion in the relation of the \ndeeper workings of things. I've always been impressed with how \nrealistic most of it seems, having been filtered through the \n\"lay-brains\" of Severian, Horn, etc. Ever read a \"popular\" book on \nQuantum Mechanics? I've yet to see one get it right. I've NEVER seen \nany science fiction in which it's down right (that is, when people try \nto dig deeper than Severian ever does).\n\nIn this particular case, however, I'm neither surprised nor confused \nabout the existence of these different technologies. In our own world, \nwe have rockets yet I've still seen the occasional horse and buggy \nplopping down the road.\n\n\nMichael" } ] } ] }